My Generation
by Kasperlock0628
Summary: This story revolves around an original character as she offers help to the heroes after Claire's fall from the ferris wheel. All main characters are involved.
1. Chapter 1

It was just past 9'oclock, which to Claire Bennett marked the end of another fun-filled day of working for the Federal Government. For three months now, she could be seen inside any news magazine in the country. _Claire Petrelli hired by Government to be liaison in affairs of "Abnormal Genome Complex" community. _Claire hated two things about this story and the variations that came from other magazines; one the Government's insistence that she take on the recognizable name of her biological father and two, the title "Abnormal Genome Complex."

When representatives of the President's PR branch approached her to act as a sort of spokesperson after her big reveal, she had been reluctant. Their answer, when one leaps from a Ferris wheel and forces an inestimable number of the public to be seen in a new light, that person should see their action through. Unfortunately, the name Petrelli was already recognized through the "Abnormal Genome Complex" community and not in a good light. What else can you expect when dad led a secret operation to round up any evolved people they could find evidence of. Most people in the PR branch don't seem aware of that little botch up and Claire certainly wasn't going to give anyone the idea. That road was probably best left untraveled…. again.

The name "Abnormal Genome Complex" was chosen because the words special and super both hinted at superiority over the general public. So the obvious answer was to create a name that instead placed a certain amount of inferiority in the evolved community.

Letting out a final sigh, Claire turned out her desk lamp, while grabbing her jacket off the back of her chair. That was when she noticed the silhouette of a woman standing in the doorway of her office.

"Can I help you?" Claire asked, checking her watch.

" I think the question here is, can I help you."

Claire's face contorted into a look of confusion, "I'm sorry. I'm not sure I understand."

The woman then stepped into the light of the lamp near the office bookcase. She seemed to be about 5'10 with long auburn hair; striking green eyes and an over confident smirk gracing her fair skinned face.

"You took a pretty big gamble with your little carnival stunt. Pretty young for all this responsibility, dontcha think?"

"It was time" Claire answered," you can't expect these people to live in the shadows forever."

"No, I guess not", conceded the woman, "puts you in a pretty dangerous position though, there's a lot of angry and confused people out there. "

"You must spend some time in the mail room; that's where most of the angry and confused people send their sentiments. Or are you a little more intimate with the angry and confused?"

The Woman smiled, " You don't seem too worried about that."

"I don't bruise easy." Claire answered.

"Right, you're the indestructible cheerleader. I guess I can see how the threat of violence could be less frightening for you, than others. Still, doesn't mean you couldn't disappear. Your security here is pretty pathetic." The Woman sank in the over priced leather chair in the middle of the room.

"Hypothetically, if someone were to try to take off with me, I would have a security team downstairs prepared for a situation just like this."

The Woman snorted, "Yeah, I caught Joe Schmoe at the guard desk. Something tells me he might have succumbed to the charms of a box of homemade doughnuts, laced with a particularly strong brand of good, old fashioned arsenic."

Claire's face fell slightly. "He wouldn't have really been an obstacle."

"Oh, that's right. He's not dear Uncle Peter who can match pretty much any "Evolved " opponent he comes up against. Then there's daddy dearest, Noah Bennett. who handles weaponry like a kid in candy store. I'm shaking in my boots!"

Clair glared at the Woman. "If you'd done better research, you would know that there's another player. Goes by the name of Sylar, maybe you've heard of him? He's a pretty big deal to some people."

"Of course, how could I forget? And you're probably right, he would be a small obstacle, enough to irritate me at the very least."

"Oh, I can assure you, he'll do more damage than that. He's a force to be reckoned with."

The Woman pursed her lips in consideration, "Explain something to me real quick; not that I'm doubting you or your team here but, where the hell are these badasses?"

"What?" This conversation was getting weirder and weirder as it went on. Claire knew that threats and attacks would be part of the territory and to be perfectly honest that wasn't too big a difference from the life she had led before.

"You would think someone would be here by now. To check on you? Since it's been 15 minutes since you turned out your desk lamp there."

"So, what happens now?" Claire asked.

Standing the woman answered, " Let's discuss wages, boss."

"Wages?"

"The way I see it, you're looking at prime security real estate. I told you I was here to help."

Claire's eyes narrowed, "Next time, maybe you could refrain from killing people already IN employment here. Then, maybe you might have a chance."

The Woman nodded," Mmmmm, I can see where that would cause tension….if any of your staff were actually in a life threatening situation, right now."

Claire's eyebrows shot up. "You mean they're…"

"Perfectly fine, completely oblivious to my presence? Yeah, that's what I mean. Joe Schmoe might have a little bit of a headache when he comes to, though. Sorry, girl's gotta get her kicks somehow. The others? Probably haven't even noticed that your desk lamp is out, yet. It's nice to see you have genuine concern for your employees, though."

Claire was surprised by the sobering tone the Woman had in her last sentence. She collected her bag from the edge of her desk and walked closer to the center of the room, where the Woman stood.

"So you're looking for a job? In my security department?"

" For starters. I happen to believe I could be of help. Without getting all mushy, I cried, you know…. when your stunt hit the airwaves."

"I think that was a lot of people's reaction."

"You'll do things different, right? No, locking us up in cells to study us, or talking us into camps set up in the desert where people will "cure" us? No attempts at creating a serum offering up powers to those without them?"

Claire's eyes widened, "How do you…"

"I know a lot of things. I should warn you though, some of the old generation won't be very happy, if I get involved. But I'd like to help do things right. If that's what you're shooting for."

Claire eyed the woman suspiciously then checked her appointments in her Blackberry. "Can you be here tomorrow? Around nine in the morning? You can meet some of the people in my … team, for lack of a better word. We'll see what they think about your offer."

" Go team! I live around here, it won't be much of a stretch." The Woman chuckled, heading for the doorway of the office. _Wow, must be loaded _Claire thought, _it's pretty pricy around here._ The Woman's lip twitched, as if she had heard her.

"Hey!"

The Woman turned, "Hey back."

"What's your name? So I can give it to the front desk, that way you won't have to go sneaking around tomorrow. And maybe the day shift will have better luck withstanding any sweets than the night shift."

"Rose," the Woman answered.

"Just Rose?"

The Woman smiled, "For now."

" You're not going to turn out to be some kind of wanted felon are you?" Claire said rolling her eyes.

"Well, if I am, I'll go along great with your serial killer. No one would be able to say you aren't an equal opportunity employer."

Claire laughed at that, "You have a point."

"Your boys are getting curious as to why you're taking so long now. They're on their way up."

With that, Rose turned and walked out the door. Once Claire heard the doors to the stairway close, she turned out the bookcase lamp.


	2. Chapter 2

Rose checked the room number once again, to be sure she had heard the guard at the security desk right. _Dead ringer, room number 528. Oh look, isn't that cute, _Rose thought, as she examined the almost illegible scrawl of the hand made sign, designating the room, the conference room. She took a deep breath, _Please let me be right about this. _She knocked twice on the door.

"Come in," she heard a male's voice call.

As quietly as possible, she turned the knob and opened the door wide, so she could stand in its frame. In the middle of the room, was a long conference table surrounded by expensive leather rolling chairs. Along one side of the long table sat four people. They were bunched together in the middle of the table's length. Rose smiled to herself; these people seemed almost fully invested in their own activities. From the inside of the group, Claire offered her a friendly smile. On Claire's left was Noah Bennett, obsessively scouring over his computer; hunting down possible identifications for her, no doubt. To Claire's right, sat Peter Petrelli, texting on his blackberry. Rose let her gaze linger on him for a moment feeling a tightness in her chest. The man sitting on Peter's right, by process of elimination, could only be Sylar. Rose examined him curiously, he seemed to be off in a different world with his eyes glazed over like that.

_Nice try, Hotshot. Scanning for my abilities, too bad it's not working. _Rose thought behind her polite stare. She almost broke out into a smile when she saw Peter turn to a bewildered Sylar, for his results.

"Please, Rose, have a seat," Claire welcomed. It was then that the men in the room finally acknowledged her.

Squinting slightly, Peter asked her," You look familiar. Have we met before?"

Rose forced a smile and answered, "No, I don't believe so." She received a curious look from the man called Sylar.

"Well," Claire began," let's start with the introductions. Rose, this is my adoptive father Noah Bennett, he helps head up the security here. Peter works as my main personal security and Sylar deals more with the background and scans of the area. They normally go out in public with me for meetings and other publicity opportunities and they usually hang around the building, when I'm here."

"Pleased to meet you all," Rose responded, taking a seat across the table from the group.

"Please forgive me for being rather abrupt here, Rose, but I'm afraid I have some suspicions as to why you're interested in a position here, with Claire and her campaign. It just seems strange that you would show up one day, undetected I might add, and offer to work here. Right now, we aren't exactly a popular group to apply with." Noah began, eyeing her up and down before glancing back at his computer, probably checking to see if she matched any of the profiles he had on his screen.

"No problem. I understand this must be unexpected, me showing up out of the blue. But I would love an opportunity to become a part of this movement. I feel I have much to offer, along with my skills at avoiding detection."

"I'm sure we're all excited to hear about your qualifications. Why don't we get started by getting a full name to work with?" Noah asked, preparing to enter them name as she said it into his database.

"Well," Rose began," my first name is obviously, Rose and my middle name is Allison."

She waited while Bennett entered the information into his computer then he glanced up at her asking, "And your last name?"

Rose blew out her breath, while the others watched her curiously. _This probably won't be popular_.

"Linderman", snipped a new voice from the hallway.

Rose didn't know whether or not she should be alarmed that, overtime, she had actually missed that voice and the woman it belonged to. Rose twisted her chair around to address the woman in the doorway. "Angela, what a surprise. Who would have thought that you would be here!"

Angela acknowledged the woman's sarcasm with a slight tightening of her lips. "I suppose the same thing could be said of you. Last I remember, you felt you were above efforts such as this."

"I'll be honest, my first reaction was to buy a one way ticket to lovely Canada, always painfully neutral there. Then, after realizing the cold would never sit well with me, I decided why not throw myself into this mess, wholeheartedly. It's only a matter of time before the yellow stars come out, you know."

Angela Petrelli turned to Bennett who was frantically typing on his computer. "Noah, you can stop searching for the girl, I'm quite positive you won't find anything on her."

"Why not?" Claire asked, sharing the same confused expression as the rest of the table.

"When I went missing, about ten years ago, my father destroyed any evidence that I existed; expressly for the purpose of keeping me out of the hands of organizations such as Primatech. I do believe that is what it was going by last."

"So you're father was protecting you from being discovered." Claire said, sending a glance over to the man who had basically done the same thing for her. Bennett, though, was gaping at Rose, astonished by her knowledge when he had no idea who she was.

"More like the other way around." Rose answered. "Father dearest, didn't want me vandalizing his precious schemes and investments."

"Your father loved you dearly. I should think the enormous inheritance left to you should provide some evidence of that." Angela snapped, eyeing the younger woman with disapproval.

"No doubt, my father loved me. Still, it's hard to remain supportive of anyone, no matter who they are; when their "work" places many people in danger, including yourself."

"Hold on a sec! What exactly are we talking about here?" Peter turned to his mother for answers. "You're saying that this is Daniel Linderman's daughter? With as much time as our family has spent with Linderman, don't you think I would have known something about her?"

"That certainly is a million dollar question." Rose joked receiving a withering glance from Angela.

"She said it herself Peter, she didn't see Daniel very often and you weren't exactly someone with whom he entrusted his secrets to." Angela supplied, coming further into the room and seating herself at the head of the table.

"She looks close to my age." Peter objected. "I would think that I would have known her, at some point, when we were kids."

"Yeah, we're in the same ballpark, about 18 months. Me being the oldest, of course."

"Peter," Angela reasoned, "you hardly knew Charles Deveaux's daughter before you began caring for him, in his last months."

"He wasn't around like Linderman." Peter argued. "I had no idea of Charles' involvement in your group, until after his death."

"Well, you can chalk that up to the luck that your ability didn't manifest at the age of six," Rose offered.

"What sort of ability?" This came from Sylar. It was the first time he had spoken during the meeting and his voice held a tremor of uncertainty in it.

Rose glanced over at Angela, as if to discern some sort of direction from the older woman.

"Don't look at me, dear. It was your choice to come here, after all."

Rose turned to the rest of the table with a sigh. It wasn't that she was burdened by her ability, but she knew that them finding out about it put her in a position she had worked hard to stay out of. _This is how it should happen, _Rose reminded herself. It was time to become apart of her generation and try to make sense of all this.

"It's a form of empathy" Rose began, "my mind acts as a receptor and storage device for abilities. If I'm even in the same room as another special, I can tap their power and file it away in my head for future use."

"How do you access others' abilities?" Sylar questioned intensely. The others shuffled uncomfortably in their chairs.

Rose met his gaze head on. "Think of everyone's brain as a computer. Computers can communicate with each other, as well as, share files. Basically, that's what I do, I access other people's ability files. Even when I'm not focusing on it my mind can subconsciously hone in on the mind of a special. Once I gain the ability, I can store it away and open it up whenever I want."

Peter regarded Rose curiously, "How can you handle that many abilities?"

"My brain compacts them down, like I said, into files. I can call them up."

"Do you know how many powers you have obtained?" Noah asked.

"It would be difficult to calculate. I would have to go through each power individually, and that could take a while. I can also remove the abilities if I find they don't work for me. "

Sylar was incredulous, "You throw away powers?"

"There are powers out there that even you wouldn't want." Rose explained.

"What was the first ability you gained?" Claire asked curiously.

"My father's, of course." Rose answered.

"Other than your father's?" Claire specified.

Rose smiled sadly as she answered. "The ability to generate electrical currents through my body."

She could feel everyone in the room freeze, but she didn't care about them, she was too busy staring down Sylar, as a blue ball of charged energy sat on top of her hand.


	3. Chapter 3

Rose left the room with a handful of papers that she would be spending the evening filling out. _Weird, I'll actually have an identity again._

Rose looked up from her giant stack of papers to see Peter talking to a woman further down the hallway.

The woman turned and glanced at Rose, then smiled. _Emma. _Rose shook her head when Emma began walking toward her.

"_I'll explain later," _Rose signed. Then she turned and walked down the hallway.

The next day, when she arrived at the generic office building; she was met at the security desk.

"Oh gee, do I get a personal tour guide for the day? Or could you just not wait to see me again?"

Sylar gave her a small smile. "Or maybe I was just checking in with Ted here myself and now that you're here, I was thinking we could ride the elevator together. Since there's a chance we might become coworkers and all."

"Promise not to eat my brain in the elevator?" Rose questioned.

She caught the angry flash in Sylar's eyes before he could cover it. Whoops, she had hit a nerve.

"The elevators are this way," he finally answered.

Rose silently followed him to the elevators and waited as he pushed the arrow pointing up. Once the elevator opened, they both stepped inside.

As soon as they stepped out of the elevator, Sylar turned to her. "Congratulations, you have survived your first elevator ride with a renowned serial killer."

Rose smiled sarcastically, "Now, if I just make it through the billions more I'm sure we'll have, I'll be well on my way to success."

"Is this about her?" Sylar asked.

Rose froze. "Her who?" she asked turning back to him.

Sylar held up his hand as blue bolts of electricity began crackling on top of it.

Rose let her gaze travel to his hand then back up to his face. She had succeeded at keeping her face completely neutral, unfortunately, the rest of her body had gone completely rigid.

"She meant something to you, I can tell." Sylar stepped closer to her. "I know this will probably mean nothing but I am sorry; for how I handled things with her."

They both stood staring at each other. Then, there came a piercing screech that had Sylar cringing and clutching his head.

"You two, quit playing in the hall! We do have a business to run here."

Rose turned to find Angela standing behind her. "And just what is it we are trying to sell to the masses?"

Angela gave a chilly smile, "Come inside so that we may begin, both of you."

She then turned on her heel and marched back down the hallway.

"I think she might hate you more than me. And I killed her son."

"Yeah, and if you would stop pissing me off, we could actually be allies."

Sylar began following her down the hall; still massaging his ringing ears. "Believe it or not, I was simply trying to alleviate some of the hostility I was receiving from you."

"Well don't, it's not something we need to discuss. Also, learn to take a joke. Everyone has instances in their lives that they won't ever live down. Yours, happens to be your strange fascination with what the inside of people's heads look like."

They finished the rest of the walk down the hallway in silence. As they turned into the doorway they found everyone else sitting in pretty much the same places they were yesterday. Yes, that did include Angela, sitting at the head of the table. Rose tried to resist rolling her eyes, then gave up.

"My dirty laundry," Rose said, handing the stack of forms to Bennett.

"It's all here?" Bennett questioned.

"Right down to my brand of undies on Saturday nights."

"Well, Noah will be going over this information for the remainder of the day and entering it in to our databases," Angela explained.

Rose couldn't help but wince. This wasn't easy for her, having all this information out in the open, after having it buried for ten years. Strange as it might sound, she felt naked as she watched Bennett skim through her files.

"So Rose," Claire interjected, "We thought we might do something a little different for the rest of the day."

"Okay," Rose answered, eyeing the group suspiciously.

"We were wondering, if you would be up for a run down of the place." Peter explained.

"Oh yeah?"

"It would be with these two here." Claire explained pointing to Peter and Sylar. "We're all really interested in what you can do, but unfortunately, if I don't make my appointments today, someone will have my head." Claire rose from her chair and began gathering her things. "You know, just think of this as bonding time for you guys. Chances are ,one of them will wind up being your partner, one day."

Claire gave Rose an encouraging smile then left the room. Bennett followed behind her, his nose stuck in Rose's files. _And then there were three_, Rose thought, at least, until she caught the head of the table in her peripheral. _Damn._

"Well, I suppose we should head down to the basement then." Angela said, rising.

"Actually, Mom, I think Claire's right. We should use this time to get to know Rose and let her know us." Peter stated, rising as well.

"Peter, I'm not sure that's a good idea," Angela argued, glancing nervously at Rose.

"Mom, it'll be fine, besides, it's what Claire wants."

"Yes, but I'm not sure that Claire ….."

"Mom, we agreed to give Claire the reigns, remember? Besides, what she's asking for isn't exactly absurd. We'll even see if we can coax Parkman out for lunch."

"Alright, if this is what you want."

Rose and Sylar stood and began working their way to the door. As soon as Rose was next to Sylar, she smiled broadly at Angela. "Don't worry, mommy. We'll return him home in one piece."

With that, they walked out the door, leaving Angela to glare after them.


	4. Chapter 4

"So, feel like checking the place out a little bit? We can give you a run down of what goes on here." Peter offered, as they made their way to the elevators.

Rose pursed her lips, " I think I left my golden ticket at home but if you can get me in free, I'd love to see the everlasting gobstopper machine first."

"Ok well, glass elevator is this way, please." Peter ushered her in with a flourish of his arm. Rose smiled as she passed him. After punching in the desired floor, Peter turned back to her and held her gaze for a moment. "Are you sure we haven't met? I really feel like I know you from somewhere."

"It's the face. I have one of those faces that everyone just recognizes, I guess." Rose answered turning from Peter to stare straight ahead. Sylar coughed from the other side of the elevator.

"Yeah, I guess. Emma seemed to know who you are, too. She was the woman I was talking to after the meeting, yesterday." Peter said looking at her curiously.

"Well, that might be one instance where the person does know me. Emma's treated me a couple of times."

"As in medically?" Peter asked surprised.

"You would be surprised how hard it is to get treatment when there are no records of you ever existing."

The elevator doors opened up to the basement and Peter stepped through, turning back to continue his conversation with Rose. "So, she gave you illegal treatment?"

Rose snorted," Do you honestly think she would be that stupid! She just helped me out from her apartment when she could." Rose stopped for a second and studied Peter. "She's an amazing woman."

Peter stopped, "Yeah, she is. That still doesn't explain why she would go out of her way to help you, though."

Rose shrugged, "Maybe I helped her out, too."

Sylar finally spoke up. "Helped her with what?"

Rose turned to him blowing out an exaggerated sigh. "Let's see, what could a person with abnormal abilities living in the world possibly fear? Hmmmm, I guess it could be the secret organization, which hunts down people like us; rips them from their lives and if we're lucky, simply tags us with tracking devices. Or, there's the elder Petrelli's secret government operation. You know, the one that happened to fall into the hands of a man hell-bent on pulling an Adolph Hitler and ridding this world of people like us, all together. Or, just a little cherry on top, the guy who was running around while all the rest of this stuff was happening, picking us off one by one." She turned to Sylar for the last bit. "I'm not trying to bring up the past here, I'm just trying to be as accurate in my account, as possible."

"Emma wasn't in danger then, many of the people with abilities out there weren't identified." Peter's voice rose an octave.

"Obviously, more than you thought! You know, I get that the last three or four years have been hell for you, both of you. It sucks, finding out that you're a pawn in somebody's ultimate plan, or that someone you love could be responsible for something so terrible, believe me. But here's the kicker. With everything that you were going through you had, at the very least, an idea of what the hell was going on. Think about what it was like for someone who had no idea. No answers for what was happening to them besides, maybe if they were lucky, a copy of some book, dug up from the dregs of the local library. When all you know is you're being followed, people are missing and the Government, YOUR Government, is endorsing this; all bets are off."

"She's never mentioned any of this to me." Peter stated, staring dazedly at Rose, still processing her rant.

"And why would she? We helped each other out in a scary time. I highly doubt that she is going to divulge that information to just anyone," Rose returned.

"I'm not just anyone, alright!" Peter fired back

Rose froze and her entire body went rigid with the realization. "You're dating her."

Peter took a breath before he began speaking again, this time much calmer. "Yeah, and I don't know, if you know but she's been through an ordeal recently with that whole carnival incident. I just….recently, I have been a little protective, is all. I just….she beats herself up about it sometimes, even though she couldn't really help what happened. So please….I would appreciate this information."

Rose was silent for a moment then, quietly, she said, "Maybe you should ask her."

"I'm asking you."

Peter and Rose seemed trapped in a staring contest as Sylar stood to the side, uncomfortably watching the other two. Finally, Rose broke eye contact. "Let's get on with the tour, Willy Wonka, then if you boys promise to foot the bill, I'll let you take me out somewhere nice. Where I will answer any questions you have. Deal?"

"Ok," Peter finally answered. "So this is the basement as you can see, this is where we do most of our sparring or practice as it were………"

And with the tension somewhat relieved, the tour continued through the building.


	5. Chapter 5

"You have got to be kidding me! All this government cooperation and we still have to go down the street to get food." Rose joked, shaking her head.

"I can assure you, if the government did provide some sort of dining option, you would still be going down the street for food. Though, you did seem more happy with the vending machine candy bar, than the food Angela Petrelli provided." Sylar remarked as they exited the elevator.

"Well," Rose said "there was a better chance the candy bar wasn't poisoned."

The tour was over and surprisingly, everyone would live to tell about it. Rose and Sylar had gathered their belongings and were heading out the door. They stopped on the curb.

"Peter should be here soon with the car," Sylar supplied "it takes a while to bring it around, especially at this time of day. Traffic, you know."

"Yeah, while I'm not complaining because the placement is convenient, I don't get why New York is where you guys chose to place headquarters."

"Well, it was between here and Odessa, Texas. We thought it would be good to choose a place that had sentimental value to the group, I guess."

"Well," Rose said "Odessa, Texas certainly wouldn't allow you to blend in. Besides, think about how much dirt would have compacted in your lungs in three just months."

"As opposed to the smog?" Sylar questioned.

"True, true," Rose conceded.

Just then Peter pulled up in a Cadillac 300 bathed in a smoky grey color. Rose went ahead and let her mouth drop open. "Oh seriously? I have been killing to ride in one of these." She smiled back at Sylar, punching his arm. "Pun SO intended. Shotgun."

Rose skipped off to the car, opening the passenger side door and sliding sensually inside. "Hello, baby. I have been waiting to touch you for sooo long." She whispered seductively.

"Ummmmm…… hello," Peter said staring at her, as if she had grown a second head.

"Oh, not you, the car." Rose replied, then started running her fingers over all of the glorious gadgets she could get her fingers on. All at once, the air conditioner blasted on; the radio began flipping through stations and changing out with CD and Mp3 player modes, the GPS came on and started blasting through all the variations of maps of their location it could produce. Through all the bleeps and bloops, the other two passengers of the car were voicing first, their confusion then their protests. Once they realized she was the cause of the demonic possession of the car.

"Could you please just….. control yourself,? We are in the middle of traffic." Peter demanded.

"Why? You can drive the car just fine, I'm not messing with any of those parts."

"It's distracting! Though, I appreciate that you didn't try to take over the actual piloting of the car." Peter responded, giving Rose a less than honest smile.

"Oh, it's not that I didn't try, but the computer suggested the car be in the proper settings, for those applications. You know, not in motion." Rose smiled angelically at Peter, who tried to keep his focus on the road.

"So, you can communicate with actual computers, too. Any idea how you came across that power?" Sylar asked from the backseat.

Rose turned to face him, making some silly gesture she hoped would pass for a Chinese sensei move. "All in good time, grasshopper."

The car pulled up to the restaurant's valet parking attendant and it's passengers climbed out. After forlornly watching the car pull away, Rose turned and entered the restaurant with the other two.

"You know, it's been years since I've been here." Peter said, looking around the waiting area that was decorated with high priced art, set into walls of dark but subtle colors.

"Why did you stop coming ?" Rose asked curiously.

"I guess, maybe I just got pinned down with school. I hardly ate out ever during those years. Also, my parents used to love this place. Communication wasn't too good back then, so I probably didn't want to risk an encounter."

"I heard about Arthur's dismay at your choice in nursing." Rose said softly, almost as if she were saying it more to herself. Hearing her, Peter turned and was about to say something when….

"Personally, I don't get the draw of this place." Sylar butted in. "The only time you would see me here, was on valentine's day with my special lady. Even then, the lady better be pretty damn special."

Rose rolled her eyes, "Well, aren't you just the man every girl dreams of."

"I'm realistic, which is something that many women appreciate."

Rose chuckled, "Yeah, but those girls don't get let out of the asylum on Friday nights."

"May I help you?"

The group turned to see a young hostess standing before them, with a helpful smile on her face.

"Table for four, please" Peter requested.

"Four?" Rose demanded. She dreaded finding out who that fourth member might be. _Just don't be Angela and this meal can actually have a chance at being pleasant._

"Yeah, Claire said if she got out at a decent hour and we were still here, she would swing by." Peter answered, before returning his attention to the hostess as she led them to a secluded booth in the back of the dining area.

"You mean, we could actually be here that long?" Sylar asked.

"Oh buddy, " Rose joked " we could be here all night long. This crowd knows how to make some mean martinis."

Sylar rolled his eyes as they began arranging themselves into the small nook where their table was placed. Rose took the seat that backed up against the original wall of the restaurant, while the boys sat on either side of her, their backs to the walls making up the nook.

"Will you be wanting the curtain open or closed?" The hostess asked, her hand hovering next to the string that held the curtain in place.

"Open, please." Peter responded politely. The hostess nodded and headed back to her station.

"So, what's good here?" Sylar asked, examining the menu.

"Chicken Parmesan." Both Rose and Peter answered.

All three of them looked up. Peter looking curiously at Rose, while Rose stared back at Peter and Sylmar switched off ,looking between the two.

"The filet it is." Sylar finally said.

Just then, the waiter approached the table to take drink orders. Peter and Sylar, being the gentlemen they were, allowed Rose to go first.

"I would like a Grey Goose vodka martini, shaken not stirred with a twist of lime."

"Excellent. And for you, sir?" the waitress asked, turning to Peter.

"Ummm….the same thing." He answered weirdly, never taking his eyes off of Rose.

"I'll have……water for now please, thanks." Sylmar told the waitress.

"Awww, you don't want to play with us?" Rose asked, pouting her lip.

"I can't enjoy the benefits of alcohol," Sylmar answered. "My kidney regenerates to fast for it to take effect."

Rose then turned to Peter," Shouldn't you have that same problem? You did inherit Claire's ability, right?"

"Not necessarily, I ran into some trouble a while back. Now, I'm only able to tap one ability at a time." Peter answered.

"So what's your ability this week?" Rose asked.

"Flying."

"Flying? But that was Nathan's ability……..and he's dead, so how.."

"There's a kid on staff," Peter interrupted "he has the same ability and he's been really generous in allowing me to use it. So, you said that you would answer some questions for us."

"Fire away, Gentleman." Rose said as she imitated a salute at them.

"How old were you, when you left Linderman's care?" Peter began.

"I actually never left his care. He's been providing for me all my life. I just wasn't as present in his life anymore or at all, actually. Though, he did still sometimes beg for me to come home, on holidays. I never saw him again."

"How old were you, at the time?" Peter asked again

"I was 19."

"What happened that made you feel like you had to leave?"

"I just realized that there were no limitations as to what our parents were willing to do. No one was off limits. Parents are supposed to protect their children. Be there for them, if they need help. Not find ways to manipulate them to their biggest advantage. You have to admit, at the end of the day our PARENTS, weren't really parents at all."

"I don't believe that," Peter challenged. "I have some pretty good childhood memories."

"I will give you this, your parents weren't as bad as some of the others. It also helped that it took so long for your powers to manifest, what with the eclipse and all. It might have just saved you from an entirely different childhood."

"My mother may be a lot of things, okay." Peter started " But I can't see her throwing me or Nathan to the sharks."

"Right, she wasn't planning on you blowing up half of New York City and possibly yourself, just so she could get her other son into the Whitehouse. Must have been one of those dreams I have." Rose countered.

Peter stared at her coldly while the waitress set their drinks down and took their orders. Sylar tried his best to appear, to the waitress, as if there wasn't tension mounting between the group.

Once the waitress was gone, Rose sighed," Look, low blow, ok? I'm sorry. I know you and I have had relatively different experiences. And I can't expect you to think of your mother as this horrible monster because in reality, she's not. She provided for you and protected you, hell, she supported you when you told her you wanted to be a nurse. Ok, that's one face of the coin, your side, if you will. Now on the other side are people that your parents, my parents, basically that whole group, saw as expendable." Rose paused sadly for a moment. "And sometimes that way of thinking didn't exclude their children."

"Elle," Sylar spoke up.

Rose turned to him. "Yes, Elle. I can honestly say I may never, in my whole life, despise someone the way I did Bob Bishop."

Peter sighed "But Elle had to be contained. Not that I didn't have some sort of affection for the girl, but she was not all right in the head."

"And, what, you think she just magically woke up one day, criminally insane?" Rose asked.

"No, of course not. I'm aware that Bob's parenting techniques might have played a part in it." Peter answered shifting uncomfortably in his chair.

"Elle wasn't criminally insane."

Rose and Peter turned to Sylar as he spoke. "She was broken. She wasn't a maniacal schemer, who plotted to kill innocent people. She did what she thought would gain her praise and acceptance."

"Exactly." Rose agreed. "She had been in and out of the Company since she was four. She and I would play together while, our dad's attended their meetings with the rest of the group. She thought it was the coolest thing that I could do what she could. It made her feel less alone, I guess. You know, all the work they did on her to see how much voltage she could produce; none of it was used to help her control her ability. Bob Bishop was too concerned with proving that his little girl was top ranking among this generation. So, during a rather stressful round of testing, they got Elle to produce such a large amount of voltage in her body, that she was out cold for three whole days, basically, a zombie for weeks, afterwards. No emotion. No response to stimulation of any kind. She ate when they told her to." Rose laughed cruelly. "They actually had to have someone take her to the bathroom periodically, because if they didn't, she would go wherever she was at the time and wouldn't even notice it."

The whole table fell into silence as Rose tried to reign in her emotions.

"They brought her to the house, once. Trying to see if maybe interaction with me could produce anything." Rose continued.

"Did it?" Sylar asked a little breathlessly.

Rose took a large gulp of her martini. "Oh yeah, but not the reaction they were hoping for ,I'm sure. See, we used to do this thing when we saw each other. Sort of our own secret form of greeting." Rose lifted her hand and let a single jolt of blue electricity shoot from her palm. "Like every other time, I did it. As soon as she saw the electricity, she started screaming. Pretty soon the screams turned into heart wrenching sobs, God it was awful. Bob Bishop just stood there reprimanding Elle over her sobbing, telling her 'that this was not appropriate behavior.' Slowly, but surely after that though, she became more like her old self. Her mother was worried sick, though. From what I could tell she and Bob had been fighting about it, constantly. So, she took Elle to spend the week at her mother's. Something happened while she was there. I don't know what but when she came back to the Company headquarters, mom and grandma were dead and she was a permanent resident at the facility."

"She could never recall any of that." Sylar interjected.

"No, a couple of weeks after she had been back , I came to see her like I did most afternoons, when dad was checking on things in the facility. She was a completely different person and when I brought up anything about the testing or the disappearance of her mother, she had absolutely no idea. A week afterwards, I met a young man everyone called The Haitian."

"Yeah, he's still around." Peter said.

"I was just a kid, but I knew that guy was bad news, I avoided him like the plague. All the while, I kept thinking, if they would do this to their own kids, what kind of chance does a stranger have against them?"

"Do you think the Haitian ever took away your memory?" Peter asked looking at her sympathetically.

Rose smiled proudly, "Nope, bastard's powers don't work on me." Then she added bitterly, "couldn't repress a damn thing. I guess I owe the ability of being able to block others from my mind, to him. I can't suppress others from using their ability when it's not directed toward my mind, though."

"So, once you left the Company and your father, did you keep in touch with Elle?" Sylar asked.

"Yes, though not in the traditional way. I would talk to her, through a mental connection, her mind."

"And she could answer back?" Peter asked.

"Yeah, only problem was, I had to establish the connection for it to work. Neither of us wanted the Company to be able to track me through her, so she kept it a secret that she was in contact with me. When I found out she had joined forces with Arthur Petrelli, I flipped. Begged her to leave; said that I would find a way to get her to me. She wouldn't leave, though. We know what happened after that…."

"And this whole time that you were with your father, with Linderman, you never once met me or my brother?" Peter asked.

"No."

"Lie." Sylar blurted.

"Damn it, I forgot about that one." Rose hissed, glaring at Sylar.

"So, we have met ?" Peter said "Why don't I remember you?"

"It was only briefly." She replied.

She could feel Sylar beside her drawing in a breath to deflect that one, too. But this time she was prepared for it. Sylar felt a hitch in his throat and began coughing. **Please, don't. I swear I will explain myself to you but you CAN'T call me on this one. Please, this would only hurt him.** After several seconds Sylar nodded to show he agreed with the request she had just projected in his head. Then all of a sudden the irritation in his throat stopped.

"You ok, man?" Peter asked, with a worried expression.

"Yeah, renegade ice cube." He said, referring to his throat.

"I knew your brother better." Rose continued. "We had some pretty good time's, him and I. That's probably why you don't remember me, I was just another one of Nathan's many girlfriends."

Another lie, Sylar noted, this was certainly getting interesting.

"It would have stuck in my mind that you were Linderman's daughter." Peter countered.

"I'm pretty sure it wasn't brought up all that much, besides, your mother HATED me." Rose explained.

Ah, finally a truth. "And why is that?" Sylar questioned.

"She caught me and Nathan together."

Both men at the table choked in surprise. Sylar considered for a moment, what sort of secret Rose was hiding, that would lead her to use Angela Petrelli catching her in the act as a cover up. Though, to give her credit, that would no doubt make an enemy of the queen bee.

"I would have thought you would have been a little young for him." Peter said. "That's what, a four year difference?"

"Perhaps he wasn't exactly…..well informed, on my age." Rose explained.

Yup, another lie, though, this one was a given since it rode in on the tail feathers of the one just before it.

Finally, their dinner arrived and they were careful to stick to small talk while they ate. Claire had called Peter to inform him that she would probably not be leaving the office until midnight at the earliest; due to the number of reports she needed to go over. Peter agreed to meet her in her office to relieve Bennett of guard duty, as soon as they were finished at the restaurant.

Once outside, in the restaurant's small courtyard, Peter turned to his companions, "You sure you guys don't need a ride back? I would hate for you to be stuck without transportation."

"Actually, I have a power for that, too." Rose replied.

"You do?" Peter asked.

"Yeah, see, I go and stand all the way over there on the curb and then I lift my arm like this." Rose explained, as she demonstrated the move. "Then out of nowhere this yellow car comes cruisin' up. Sometimes, it's a car; sometime's a van….."

"Yeah, yeah. I get it." Peter interrupted "So, I have one more question for you, before I go. Claire told us about your odd meeting ,in her office that night. You told her you had an ability you thought would be very helpful; in protecting her."

"Yeah, I think I do." Rose answered.

"Can I see it?" Peter asked.

"Sure'" Rose shrugged "but let's find somewhere a little more secluded to do it."

Rose led them down the street until they came to the entryway of an alley. Moving along with the alley, they found a small space in the buildings that was probably a dumpster area at one time. The lingering scent, also pointed to this conclusion.

"Okay," Rose began "Peter, I want you to come stand by me and Sylar stand across from us but a few yards back. Good. Now, Peter you get to be Claire and Sylar you're the big, bad attacker."

"Ok, what do you want me to do?" Sylar asked.

"Shoot some of that blue magic our way." Rose explained.

"Are you crazy!" Peter protested "Let's not forget, I'm NOT Claire. I don't have the ability to heal right now."

"Chill, daddio! This is what I'm supposed to be demonstrating, right? How effective I can be at not letting the bad guys win?"

"This had better work." Peter grumbled.

"That's the way to be a sport." Rose joked "Alright, Sylar, whenever you are ready."

For thirty seconds they stood there, frozen with anticipation. Then, Sylar stretched out his hand. As soon as the blue bolts lit up the alley, Peter tensed and felt………..nothing. The electricity was grinding up an invisible wall. Once Sylar ended his attack, Rose relaxed and turned to Peter. "So, are you sold yet?"

"That's incredible." Peter remarked. "And would be very helpful in this job description."

"I'll let you think on it." Rose said "See you tomorrow."

Peter headed out ahead of them, towards the restaurant to retrieve the car. Rose turned back to Sylar, who practically had drool running down his chin.

"You reciting your twelve steps?" Rose asked him.

"What?" Sylar asked shaking himself out of his reverie.

"You know, the twelve steps recovering killers say to themselves to get them to turn away from temptation." Rose offered.

Sylar rolled his eyes, "I think that's Alcoholics Anonymous you're referring to."

"Hmmm…" Rose shrugged "Maybe. Come on, let's get out of here, I know this great Irish pub that doesn't get much business on Wednesdays."

"I told you earlier," Sylar said following her out "I have nothing to gain from alcohol."

"Humor me, " Rose smiled " it just might make your night."


	6. Chapter 6

They found a table at the back of the bar that allowed them a sense of privacy. Rose had been right, there were maybe ten patrons in the bar.

"We'll take a bottle of your whiskey of the night and two shot glasses," Rose told the barmaid.

"Alright, I'd like to know what you meant about making my night?" Sylar demanded.

"I said might," Rose corrected "I haven't exactly tried this before but I have a theory."

"What is it?"

"Give me your hand." Rose said, extending her own. Sylar tentatively placed his hand in hers. "Okay, try to relax, this won't hurt a bit. I think."

"Great." Sylar said sarcastically.

They sat like that for a few moments, holding hands over the table. Sylar was about to comment when he felt heat begin to spread between their hands. He looked down at them, half expecting there to be light emitting from them but what he found was just their hands. Rose released a deep breath and slid her hand from his. A second later the barmaid laid their bottle and glasses on the table.

"So you want to explain to me what just happened there?" Sylar suggested.

"No" Rose answered " I want us to drink."

She grabbed the bottle and poured the first shots, then pushed Sylar's over to him. Lifting her glass in a salute, she downed the shot and waited for Sylar to finish his.

Shaking off sting of alcohol, he looked at her, "Can I please know why I am being forced to drink this sickening liquid?"

Rose shook her head, "Wait for it."

After two more shots, Sylar began to feel it. "How the hell?" He asked in surprise. He looked at her accusingly, "What did you do?"

"A favor, one that can be easily remedied, don't worry. " Rose answered. "What I've done, basically, is manually tapped into your brain's hardware and shared a little file I got from the Haitian. "

"You said you couldn't suppress other people's abilities, that wasn't a lie."

"True, I can't. What I did was more of a file exchange with you. See, I plugged into your brain through touch and copied this ability from my brain into yours. Then before I got out, I opened it like a file, making the ability active for you. You can turn it off anytime you like just by visualizing yourself closing the file in your mind. " Rose explained. "Do you want to try?"

Sylmar smiled, meeting her eyes, "Nah, I think I'll enjoy this for a little while."

"By all means, I make a pretty lousy lone drunkard, anyway."

Two thirds of the whiskey bottle later they were both in a cab on their way home.

"Listen," Sylar started, with a bit of a slur, "I really am sorry about Elle. I sometimes think that if things were different," he paused "if I had handled things differently, then I really think I could have, maybe …………….. loved her."

"No, you couldn't have," Rose said sadly "Elle was dependant on assurances of acceptance. That's all she would have done in her life, tried to make you proud, in love with her. You were just replacing her father in her life. In the end, someone like you wouldn't have been able to handle the dependency issues she would have had. It wouldn't have worked out."

"Maybe she wouldn't have ended up dead, though," Sylar said soberly.

"That would have been nice. Look, I'm not saying what you did is acceptable, because it's not. She didn't deserve for that to happen to her."

"But?" Sylar asked

Rose sighed, "But you had so many people manipulating you, at the time. It was pretty screwed up how they played you. I guess, what I'm trying to say is, sometimes it's hard to know whether or not someone is out to get you; especially in a world like ours. You had just found out that everyone had been lying to you and Elle still kept up the charade afterwards. I don't think she was doing it maliciously but she was lying. That doesn't excuse her death, at all, but it at least shows that you're not as horrible a monster as you would be, if say, you had just killed her to watch her die. Though that shouldn't make you feel much better."

They stared at each other for a second, soaking in what had just been said. When the cab pulled onto the curb, neither one seemed to notice.

"That secret you're hiding from Peter…" Sylar began.

Rose broke their stare, "This is my stop." She opened the car door and began to dig for money in her bag.

"I can take care of this when I get to my place." Sylar offered.

"Are you sure?" Rose asked "cause I don't mind splitting."

"You can get the next one." Sylar answered. As she turned to walk up the curb he called to her. "You will have to tell me one day, you know. I don't just keep secrets without knowing why. I've found that's a good way to get screwed."

Turning back, Rose asked, " Just give me sometime, okay? I promise I'll explain once the weirdness of all this starts wearing off."

"Weirdness?"

"This, the being back in the game and working in the same circles as these people again."

They gazed at each other for a moment before Sylar nodded and signaled the driver to go on.


	7. Chapter 7

Rose breezed through the sliding doors of the hospital and headed down the hall. Normally, Rose would have no idea how to navigate inside the hospital but today she was picking up a distinct mental signal that would lead her to the person she was trying to find.

Emma was at one of the nurses' stations on the fourth floor looking through a stack of files, almost large enough to bury her. Rose waited for Emma to notice her because Emma had always hated it when had made any communication inside her head. Once Emma looked up, the two women smiled at each other as Rose offered up a bag of chocolate éclairs.

After finding a deserted break room, the two women sat down to enjoy their treats.

"_**How have you been?"**_ Rose signed to Emma.

"_**Wonderful, things are reaching some semblance of normalcy."**_

"_**I wanted to explain some things to you, mainly about what I was doing at that meeting the other day." **_Emma began to wave her explanations off._** "No, no I do. I'm trying to get a job in Claire's security detail. I'm going to try to work with them, from now on."**_

"_**And Rebel?"**_ Emma questioned.

"_**I haven't heard from him in a while but I would still help him out when I could. This doesn't change what I've been doing. I'm just hoping that maybe this group will do things differently."**_

"_**They are good people."**_

"_**Yeah, I can see that. I also wanted to talk to you about Peter."**_ Emma gave Rose a confused look._** "Yeah, we knew each other a long time ago. He doesn't really remember me. What I wanted to say is that, I may have to explain some things that I might have been doing in the last couple of years. You would come up."**_

"_**Okay."**_

"_**I think Emma, that you should talk to Peter about it. I know it's not a big deal like, maybe say Samuel, but I would feel better if Peter heard it from you. Just so, I don't feel like I'm speaking for you or your feelings, you know. It would probably get him off my back too. Which would be nice."**_

"_**I'll talk to him soon."**_

"_**Thank you."**_ Rose stood and began to leave.

"Hey" Emma called after her, _**"Peter is a good man. You can trust him."**_

"_**Yeah, I know."**_ Rose turned and headed down the hallway.


	8. Chapter 8

For the rest of the week, Rose was released, while the group deliberated on her employment. She took this time to let her actions soak in. Rose caught herself cringing every time she thought about her father's endless supply of prophecies. Boy, was he a man for prophecies.

_Rose watched her father organize the last bit of paperwork that had been sitting on top of his desk ignored. The man probably saw over a hundred files a day; everything from banking accounts down to the latest unknown scandal on a prominent politician._

_ "You gave quite a performance at the facility." Linderman said without even looking up. "It will cost thousands of dollars to repair, not to mention the lives lost or the research." At this he finally looked up at her with that fatherly reprimand he wore so well._

_ Rose smiled softly, "Thousands of dollars you have aplenty, those lives have always been replaceable to you; so your real bone to pick would be the research."_

_ Linderman glared at her, "Sweetheart, you have no idea how far you have set us back. What we are trying to succeed here is for your benefit too, don't forget."_

_ "Yeah, one day you become king of the world through massacring half the world and engaging the rest in a hostile take over."_

_ "You know its nothing as dramatic as all that. You are still young. You do not know what is at stake here for our kind if we do not develop some kind of offensive."_

_ Rose choked out a bark of laughter, "And the torturing and disposing of our kind to get there is excusable how?"_

"_Darling, we have to make sense of all this and that can only be done through research and study."_

"_I want out." She said softly, barely a whisper. _

_He sighed, "I know you feel that way now, but if you just take some time to consider the end result…."_

"_NO! I don't want an end result this way. People are dying." Rose rasped, tears gathering in her eyes. _

"_So, what is your big plan? To run to the ends of the earth and hide? I can assure you, my dear, wherever you go, I will find you."_

"_I know. I know you will. So I'm going to make a deal with you. I leave here, go wherever I want and live a harmless, uninvolved life. I'll never be heard from again."_

"_Why should I agree to that?" _

_Rose smiled cruelly, "Because if you don't. I'll run off anyway, but I won't be disappearing into the masses. I'll be coming after your labs, your facilities, anything that is tied to your goals. Hell, I might even hit up a couple of your casinos while I'm at it. Then, once all of this destruction is public knowledge, I'll come forward as the source."_

"_No one would believe that a little girl could cause that much destruction."_

"_Not at first, no. But how are they going to deny it when it happens right in front of their eyes and gets recorded by their cameras? I'd say they would have more than enough evidence after that."_

"_You would selfishly sacrifice all of us, ALL OF US."_

"_Of course not. You would. I'm giving you another option. One that wouldn't change much at all. Just my presence here."_

"_Alright, alright." Linderman held his hands up in surrender. "You may go away, if you feel you must. But I don't want to lose contact with you. No matter what happens you are, MY child. I refuse to have you starving in some street somewhere. I want to know that you are alright." _

"_As long as no one interferes with how I live. I'm fine with that."_

_Linderman nodded, "Then it's settled, you may go. I'll have your funds and accounts updated immediately under different identities, of course. They will be renewed as need be, as long as you stay away from my dealings."_

"_Done," Rose agreed, turning to leave._

"_You will return one day, though." He called after her. "It is your destiny to be apart of this revolution. You have become too involved to just walk away from your kind. Your place is here with your generation."_

"_We'll see about that." Then she was gone._

_Linderman allowed a moment to gaze after her, then he smiled. He knew exactly why she was running and he had to admit, he was indeed proud._


	9. Chapter 9

"I think she could bring a lot to the table, she's seen things, experienced them. The knowledge she could provide would be helpful not only to your security, Claire, but also with the work we are trying to do to incorporate specials into everyday life in this country." Peter explained as he addressed his fellow partners. Claire, Bennett, Angela, Sylar, and himself were all seated on the furniture placed in the middle of Claire's office. Today was the day that they would decide whether to employ Rose Linderman. Unfortunately, there were some in the group who still had reservations.

"Peter, many of the things she has seen and experienced, as you say, were enough to drive her away from all of this. I don't want us forgetting that she had the chance to be apart of a movement such as this and that she ran from it. " Angela argued. They had just begun the discussion and it was already apparent that it would be a long one.

"She ran because things were different then. I'm sorry Mom, Noah but I think it's safe to say that some of the methods being used then were not very becoming." Pater fired back.

"She did ask me if I was planning to do things different." Claire offered from the couch that she was sharing with Bennett.

"She has had no record for ten years." Bennett stated. "Think about what a person could be doing in that time but we have no clue because there is no trail."

"Not exactly," Peter answered, "There is someone who knew her before she showed up earlier this week."

"Who?" Claire asked astounded that they could get this lucky.

"Emma," Peter responded, "I talked with her about it last night. I asked her about it earlier this week but she wouldn't tell me anything. Apparently, Rose visited her at the hospital and told her it would be okay if she did. What I got from Emma is that they met two years ago, when Nathan's secret operation had just begun. Emma found Rose injured in her apartment doorway one night. Without knowing why, Emma let Rose into the apartment and helped her out. Rose came back a few times, sometimes she had others with her who may have needed her help. The way Emma explained it was that Rose was apart of an underground railroad for specials."

"Why would Emma not have mentioned this before? Especially, after what happened with Samuel. Emma saw how dangerous it was for that group, wouldn't she have mentioned others that she knew about." Questioned Bennett suspiciously.

"Rose was hiding people, getting them new identities and any help they may have needed. They weren't a group. The only person she really knew from it all was Rose. And Rose made it very clear that no one could know about her or what she was doing. It was too dangerous. Besides, Rose looked out for Emma during that time too. Rose made sure Emma was scarce if any agents were sniffing around the area where she lived."

"An underground railroad………I helped out with something like that too. In California, it was Micah Sanders he was going by Rebel then. He would send me messages on my phone telling me where to go and who to find. Do you think she was working with him, too?" Claire asked excitedly. She could definitely respect anyone who did anything like that brave little kid.

Just then Claire's secretary, Anne, knocked then opened the door. "Ms. Petrelli, Dr. Suresh is here to see you."

"Alright, send him in, please."

Mohinder Suresh entered the room a moment later closing the door behind him. "I think I have the last of my research filed away." He began, "I appreciate what you are doing here. Everything must be kept out of the public for now. It would be complete nightmare if some violent group were to get a hold of it."

"We would like to avoid providing them with a scavenger hunt list, if we can." Claire smiled. "We are really grateful that you agreed to keep it here."

"Yes, well. It seems you have business to attend to so I'll just be on my way to the lab to pick up some personal items. " Mohinder said as he began turning back to the door.

"One moment, Mohinder." Bennett began, "I think we could use your expertise in a decision we are trying to make here."

"I'll help in any way I can."

"Please have a seat." Claire offered. "We are looking at hiring another special who has approached us, maybe you could give us some insight on any knowledge you might have about her ability. It's quite an interesting one." Claire went on to explain how Rose had explained her power to the group.

Mohinder was astonished. "In essence, it's another form of empathy. It's absolutely brilliant how she used computer analogies to explain it. I would love to meet her. She seems to have good knowledge of her ability. I would love to document it."

"Her name is Rose Linderman. She lives here in New York, so that shouldn't be too hard to arrange." Bennett offered.

"Wait a moment…….Rose Linderman? As in THE Linderman's daughter?" Mohinder asked.

"Yeah, apparently my mother is the only one here who isn't amazed at her existence." Peter explained.

"No, I knew she existed. Arthur Petrelli had a file on her." Mohinder explained.

"Excuse me!" Peter exclaimed at the same time that Sylar remarked, "He never said anything to me about her."

"The only reason that I was made aware of her was because Arthur needed Molly to track the woman down." Mohinder appeased.

"Did he send someone after her?" Sylar asked.

Mohinder turned to the man nervously. No matter what Sylar had done recently, he still made Mohinder nervous. Which was why Mohinder avoided any form of communication with him. "No, Molly couldn't locate her. It wasn't that she couldn't feel her but she couldn't pin down a location. Arthur was very disappointed when Ms. Linderman couldn't be found. Apparently, when she disappeared she took some thing that he felt belonged to him."

"Any idea what that was?" Bennett asked.

"None." Answered Mohinder. "He did say that he was the only one who could go after her, though. He didn't even feel that Mr. Grey would have been all that successful at apprehending her. Therefore, I got the feeling that she was someone pretty powerful."

"Any idea where that file he had might be now?" Asked Peter.

"Destroyed with Pinehurst, I would imagine."

"Hell, Arthur. Your father could be brilliant at times. But he was still an idiot." Angela said to Peter.

"What would Dad have been looking for, Mom?" Peter asked

"I don't know, Peter. Your father was hard to predict at times."

"That's a lie." Sylar accused, staring Angela down.

"Angela, please. The more we dig into this, the more I feel there is to learn. We want the truth." Claire implored.

"I can't be certain what it was." Angela said pausing to see if Sylar would interject. When he didn't she continued. "But there were many things she came in to contact with during her years with Linderman. What I do know is this. Linderman had her placed in facility right before she left. She had become troublesome out in public and difficult to control. Two days after she entered that facility, the place torn apart. Agents were killed, twenty in all, I believe. And that's only because those were the agents at the facility at the time, others were on assignment or vacation. She tore the labs apart, freed all of the subjects and completely destroyed the electrical wiring of the entire compound. It was then that she and Linderman came to an agreement about her living arrangements. In short, Rose Linderman threw a huge fit until she got her way. She is dangerous. Which, is why I'm sure your father was very hesitant to send his men after her. He wouldn't have anyone left if he did."

"Not that I am ignoring the fact that she did so much damage, but it seems like she has done a lot of help too." Claire began.

"A whole facility Claire. She killed people!" Bennett objected.

"To get away from the life that YOU refused to hand me over to, Dad. Obviously, she didn't have someone to fight for her so she fought for herself. They were imprisoning her there, against her will. She was desperate."

"Her father was trying to do what was best Claire." Angela argued.

"Tell that to Elle," Sylar interjected. "Even Bennett has to admit that the things done to her at the Company were not normal. If Rose was going to wind up with the same treatment, why shouldn't she fight?"

"I say we give her a try." Peter voted.

"I'm with Peter." Sylar agreed

"Claire, you must see how dangerous this could be." Angela pleaded.

"I trust the guys on this one. When I first met Rose she told me that the "Old Generation" would have a problem with her and I'm pretty sure she meant you, Angela." Claire said. "It's not that I don't value your opinion but she had a point. Things have got to be different. The moment we become exclusive is the moment we become unapproachable. Besides, it sounds like she might have an in with parts of the community we don't even know about. And if she is so great and powerful, then all the better that she is working with us instead of against us."

"Until she's not," Bennett said darkly.

Claire shook her head, "The purpose of this effort is to not label people, off the bat, as good or bad. We all took actions we weren't proud of in this mess. We can't get it right if we don't change."

"Then it's settled," Peter concluded, "she can start Monday."

Sylar entered the local coffeehouse and went straight to the bar. He definitely needed some of those authentic flavors that he had come to love from this shop. Once he had ordered his large four shot latte from the barista, he began scrounging through the stacks of left over newspapers. Selecting one that looked halfway decent he sat at a table in the back corner of the room.

"Hey, Edward Razor finger! Fancy meeting you here."

Sylar turned from the article he had just taken an interest in and glared up at Rose. "You know I love this place." He accused.

"Hmm, yeah maybe I did or maybe I've decided that I love this place too. The coffee is amazing."

"Yes, but you wouldn't know that if I hadn't brought you here the other day." Then Sylar cringed, "And stupidly told you that I come here almost everyday."

"Don't feel too bad. I did look forward to enjoying the coffee as I stalked you today."

"I don't think there is any need to stalk me. You could have called me on the phone and I would have answered." Sylar grumbled.

"I find the element of surprise to be much more satisfying." Rose answered.

"Did you hit your maturing capacity at age 15?"

"Of course not! But during my childhood this sort of behavior wasn't allowed so now I relish in it." Rose smiled.

"Well, perhaps that's because this behavior points toward psychotic tendencies, such as stalking. "

"Come on, it's been awhile since I've had a friend. Let some of my overzealousness slide, ok?" Rose asked, with a hint of seriousness in her voice.

"And the guy who killed your best friend is your only option? Man, you do have it rough."

"Okay, maybe I was wrong. " Rose said, and began getting up from the table.

"Hey," Sylar said, grabbing her hand. "I'm sorry. Look, I appreciate that you're here. I do. So please, sit back down."

Rose sank back into her seat but didn't slide her hand from Sylar's until she was completely seated.

"So, Peter called me. Says he wants me to come in on Monday for my first day of work." Rose commented.

"Yeah congratulations on that."

"How did Mrs. Petrelli handle it?" Rose inquired.

"She was infuriated but Claire gave a pretty convincing speech that even she couldn't shoot down. I do have some questions, though, about some stuff that came up in the meeting. Since we're best buds and all now."

"Okay," Rose said, fixing him with a stare of concentration.

"And keep out of my head! I don't want us to start having trust issues so early on." Sylar objected.

"Sorry, you're right. From now on it's totally off limits."

"Because you already got what you wanted, didn't you?" Sylar asked deadpanned.

"When I came in the door. I was just checking to see which question you were going to start with first." Rose smiled at him and try as he might, Sylar couldn't resist smiling back.

"So what happened in that facility then?" Sylar asked.

"I had to prove to my father that I was serious. I do regret the killings. I just got so angry, you know. I was trying to get out, be free or whatever. They were stopping me. They were going to do things to me that I couldn't let happen, not if I wanted to survive and still be myself. I was going to wait it out for a while. See if my father was actually serious. Then one day these two men came into my cell. They were going to inject me with something and once they started trying to hold me down, I got so angry. "

"Angela said you killed all the agents that were at the facility that day." Sylar said quietly.

"They wouldn't stop coming at me. If they had just run or hid from me I wouldn't have tried to catch them but they were just like mindless sharks."

"Did you know about Arthur Petrelli looking for you?" Sylar asked.

"When was Arthur not looking for me? He had a strange fascination with my ability, it was a lot like his. He's actually very creepy, even for some one out to rule the world. "

"He said there was something you had that belonged to him. Any idea what that was?"

"Yes, and it didn't belong to him." Rose answered.

Sylar waited for a moment then when she didn't say anything else he asked, "What was it?"

Rose gave Sylar a distant smile then stood up from the table. "It's been good chatting with you buddy. I'll let you enjoy your coffee in peace." With that Rose turned and left the coffeehouse.


	10. Chapter 10

_She walked with her father down the sterile corridor, willing her short legs to keep in step with his._

"_Guess what we are going to do today in Daddy's special lab, my darling?" Linderman asked smiling down at her._

"_What, Daddy?" she asked, breathlessly._

"_We are going to perform a little experiment. I want to see you do some things for me with your little power."_

"_Is somebody sick?" The girl asked, looking up at her father._

"_No, this is a little different. We are going to meet one of Daddy's friends and he is going to help us with this experiment."_

"_What's he going to do?"_

"_All in good time, my girl." Linderman said as he opened the door for the child. They stepped into a spacious exam room with an exam table and equipment on one side and an open area on the other. Motioning to the man standing in the middle of the open area Linderman said, "This is Daddy's friend, Reynard."_

_The man turned and smiled a monstrous smile at the girl and her heart began to race. Linderman pushed the girl further into the room and closer to the man._

"_Now my dear, don't be afraid. Reynard is simply going to hold your hand, alright?"_

_Reynard held out a hand to the child that was covered with scars. The girl tentatively put her hand in Reynard's outstretched one. Once he had her hand she turned to focus on her father so she couldn't see Reynard or his horrible scars. _

"_Now, Reynard is special like us and I would like for him to perform his trick on you and see what happens." Linderman explained._

_The girl glanced at the man then turned back to her father, "Will it hurt?"_

"_Maybe just a little. You are a big girl, now, almost seven. And sometimes, big girls have to endure a little pain but they can, because they are big girls. So, will you do this for me?"_

_The girl looked unsure for several seconds, "Ok, Daddy."_

_Then her hand began to feel warm, then hot and then it began to burn. The girl turned to look at her hand in Reynard's and drew in a breath to…………._

"No!!!" Rose bolted up from her bed her sheets and her nightgown soaked in sweat. She sat there for a moment regaining her breath before she through the covers to the side.

"Yeow", grumbled a voice.

Rose turned to find two yellow eyes glaring at her from underneath the discarded covers. "Sorry, Sprite. Go back to sleep."

The cat took a long look at her then placed its head back on its paws and began drifting off.

Rose grabbed a thin robe off the chair at the end of her bed and headed down the hall to the living room. She passed the TV and gave it a tap, zapping it to life. In the kitchen, Rose pulled out a K-cup and placed it into her Keurig brewer.

"…….Authorities are still unsure what led to this assault but the evidence seems to point to all six men being involved."

Rose turned to the TV. _I could have sworn I had that thing on cartoons._ Then she noticed the caption. **Multiple assailants responsible for Abnormal Genome person's death.** _Oh Great._

Rose's thoughts were interrupted by the shrill ring of her phone. "Yeah." She answered.

"You need to pack a bag. Bring enough professional clothing for no less than a week, maybe more. Be at JFK by 630 this morning and don't be late." Bennett's voice ordered over the phone.

"Yes, sir," She answered, but he had already hung up. She turned back to the TV and watched the screen as men that were involved in the assault were being brought into custody. The men didn't look angry or self-righteous but sad. As she continued to watch words flashed on the screen in a type completely different to that of the news channel. **It's starting.**Rose's eyes widened, "Oh shit."

Rose zig zagged through the terminals dodging people who were walking at a slower pace or rudely stopping in the middle of the walkways. Finally, she came to a plain gray door marked, **Authorized Personnel Only.** She knocked on the door. A moment later small but round gentleman in a sky captain's uniform answered.

"This is a restricted area, miss."

"Yes, I know. I'm with Claire Petrelli's group." Rose answered, smiling politely.

"Are you, now? Well let's see, what's your name?" The man asked eyeing her suspiciously.

"Rose Linderman."

"Well, Mrs. Linderman, I'm going to have to check on this you'll have to wait here."

"It's Ms. Linderman," Rose snarled. "Mr. Linderman was my father. You don't need to check on things because you just remembered seeing my name on the list given to you earlier. So you're going to let me through the door, tell me where the Petrelli group is and wish me a safe flight."

"You know," the man said. "I think I remember seeing your name on the list earlier, so why don't you go on in?"

"Thank you, " Rose smiled stepping through the door.

"The Petrelli group is up that ramp and to the left. Have a safe flight, Ms. Linderman." The man waved as she made her way up the ramp.

Rose found three of their group sitting in a small boarding area awaiting the flight. Claire sat in a chair on the far end of the row talking on her cell phone. Bennett was also on his phone standing in front of one of the huge windows watching the landing strip. Sylar was by himself on the other end of the row of chairs, staring at nothing.

"Hey," Rose said, taking the seat next to him. She set her carry ons on the ground and checked her cell phone. 6:08. She had gotten here in plenty of time no thanks to Captain Ornery, whom now made her regret not bringing that batch of brownies to test out. Once she saw that she had no texts from Rebel she placed her phone back in her jacket pocket.

"What the hell is that?" Sylar asked, eyeing her abnormally large carry on bag.

"What?" she asked innocently, eyes as wide as they would go.

Sylar glanced from Rose to the bag, "There's something moving in your bag." He accused pointing at the offending bag.

"It's nothing. Don't worry about it." Rose said, turning away from him to end the conversation. "Hey!!"

Sylar had used his telekinesis to drag the bag over to him. He grabbed it up, unzipped it and came face to face with a very pissed off black and white mane coon cat. "You brought a cat!?" Sylar glanced at Rose then back at the cat, which had brought itself up to a sitting position in the bag and was meeting his gaze fearlessly.

"Oh good, you made it. Now we're only missing Peter and Angela." Bennett said as he crossed over to them done with his phone call.

"They'll be late" Rose started, urging the attention toward her. "They're going to run into some complications at the ticket counter, something about Angela's bag being fifty pounds OVER weight. It's okay though, because the plane won't actually be ready to board until about 6:50."

"That's impossible." Bennett countered. "I specifically told them to do whatever they had to do to make the plane ready to go by 6:30."

"Guess it's not going to be enough. You can help Angela and Peter's case though, by calling off the maniacal Mr. Rogers watching the entrance to the terminal. He takes pleasure in stalling everyone who comes through the door for as long as he can."

Bennett sent a glare down the ramp then turned back to Rose and Sylar. "What the hell are you doing with that cat, Sylar?"

"What? I……." Sylar started to answer.

Bennett rolled his eyes, "I don't even want to know. Look, just do whatever you're going to do with it in your own time, okay? And privately. The last thing we need is a picture of you eating a cat gracing the news stands." Bennett turned and took off down the ramp to deal with the terminal guard.

Rose clamped her lips together behind her teeth to keep from smiling as she scooped her cat and bag from a stunned Sylar's lap.

"I don't even know why I try." Sylar mused darkly

"What?" Rose asked as she began petting the cat in the open bag.

"No matter what I do, I'm still gonna be just a killer to everyone and everything, apparently."

"You just got on the good guy wagon, what, four or five months ago? You have to give everyone time to believe it and get used to it. Plus, it's not supposed to be easy for you. This is your penance stage, if you make it through this then you become a good guy." Rose explained.

"Yeah? When does this end?" Sylar asked miserably.

"For some, it lasts their whole life." She answered.

"Great." Sylar said sarcastically.

"Ummmm. You could be rotting in the ground somewhere like your however many victims. You get another chance at life but it doesn't come free. You don't get to just forget about what you've done." Rose reprimanded.

"I don't think I need advice on living from the girl who totes a cat around." Sylar sneered.

"There's nothing wrong with this." Rose insisted.

Sylar turned to look at her eyes on fire. **Stop talking, now! I'm losing my patience so just back off for a while.** His words echoed in Rose's head as he stomped off across the room putting space between them. Sprite stared after him, gave a satisfied grunt and began to settle herself back in the bag.

"I know," Rose said, sadly agreeing with the cat in the bag. That's when she felt the buzz in her jacket pocket.

Peter and Angela arrived just after the plane had entered the terminal at 6:49. They all began to board the plane while Bennett barked out directions.

Peter sided up to Rose, "So first day and it's already getting fun."

"Yeah, I haven't been on a vacation in years. I'm excited."

Peter winced, "I'm afraid you'll be disappointed. Washington is going to be less relaxing with the group you signed up with."

Rose smiled, "I think I'll manage."

"Is that a cat?" Peter asked looking curiously at her bag.

"Don't ask," Sylar said as he brushed past them.


End file.
